Here I’m part of a small communication group, in fact there are a few of these small groups, where we have encounters with different ones of you, who read these posts.  In this one small e-mail group a question and a concern arose concerning Judas, coming from the last post. I want to pursue that question here, in order that each of you can think on it.  

discussing this brought up another question:

This was my answer, but it likely is not enough. 

Some of you may have engaged this same question at sometime. I had certainly done so before this. I realize that this discussion can go very deep. So I’ll attempt to bring it further forward for others of you to give some consideration.  

There are several scriptures that tell us that God forgives and forgets our sin.  One even says that they are cast as far as the East is from the west.  This question then gives rise to another deeper series of questions, which I think can yield perspective when considered.  Is it possible for all sin to be confessed?

Is it possible for all forgiven sin to be erased?  What would happen if it were?  What is the true meaning of forgiven and forgotten?

I’m taking you with me out on a limb (one that I hope I do not cut off with us on it).  We, you and I, are a product of our decisions.  God uses those that we make to help mold us into a very special vessel in His hands.  That vessel is often broken before it is reformed to be something useful. The characters in Scripture would not be (who they are) if both we and God had no recollection of their sin. A sin which helped to form them.  Had David not sinned with Bathsheba; then some of Scriptures lessons would disappear, and David would no longer be the David, that we now know.  

If my sin disappeared in my mind; then could I be as thankful for God and His marvelous grace as I am, and could I even still be able to thank God for His forgiveness of it?  Could Paul have even remembered that he was Paul “the chief of sinners”, which is what he called himself; if both he and God had no recollection of his sin.  A sin which helped to form him? 

Will one day in eternity God determine to do with sin what He says that He will do with it? 

Isaiah 43:25  “I, I [alone,] am the one who wipes out your wrongdoings for My own sake, And I will not remember your sins. (NASB2020)

God tells us that He does this blotting of sin for His own sake, not for ours. Is the blotting of it then just His alone, while the forgiveness is mostly by Him but ours?  Our sin is forgotten by God, but we are not God.  It has molded us. Some of us into greatly appreciative people. People, who are so thankful that He has paid for our sins and that He holds none of it against us.  

Think of what will happen to those whose sins He can’t forget, because their sins were never given to Him to be marked paid in full.  And He, because He is true to Himself He will and He must cause them to then pay for their own sin.  These are unconfessed sins, that Jesus paid for but the payment was never received; which then He cannot forget: can He? When confessing our sin we actually allow God to forget it, and He no longer carries its burden.  He does not want to carry it.  Think about that.  For His own sake He forgets it.  He in one sense turns our sin into a golden crown, but you and I must know what He did for us in order to see accomplished that miracle.  If we know not or remember not our sin, can we then, just become thankless before Him?  God forgets sin, (my opinion) we cannot (not in this life).  

Those who admit not their own sin cannot have it forgiven and forgotten. Our sins are placed upon Christ when we ask for them to be.   

I will ask God to remove from His presence my sin, and at the same time use me for His glory because He has allowed me to see my sins paid for by His Son my Lord.  And although I will one day (maybe) remember my own sins no more; it will not occur in this life. 

Judas could not bear the pain and burden of his own sins.  He must have never confessed them to God. He hanged Himself.  He carried and paid for his own sin?

Romans 4:7  “BLESSED ARE THOSE WHOSE LAWLESS DEEDS HAVE BEEN FORGIVEN, AND WHOSE SINS HAVE BEEN COVERED. (NASB2020)

Jesus is the only covering for our sin.  His blood makes them invisible to God. Ignore or reject Him and there is no forgetting of our sin by His Father.  Know Him or about Him, and refuse to abide in Him and you have lost your covering for your sin.  I want to every day be thankful that He did not first forget my sin, before taking it to the cross, which He came to bear. And I don’t want to forget that He no longer sees it once it is confessed to Him.  

I know that this may raise more issues, so bring them forth.  I love you and love to hear from you. Jesus loves you more.